Guillermo del Toro producing Pinocchio

Gris Grimly will direct the dark fantasy

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Because Guillermo del Toro clearly can’t survive without a thousand plates in the air at once, he’s adding the job of producer for a new stop-motion animation version of Pinocchio to his ever-growing work list.

He’s producing and co-writing the film with Gus Grimly, who illustrated a 2002 book of the story which sees Pinocchio as a much more mischievous figure than in other versions.

And Grimly will then co-direct the pic with Adam Parrish for – ready to be excited? – the Jim Henson Company. Yes, the Muppet brigade is getting into stop-motion.

Three-year task

Horror fiends Bloody Disgusting talked to del Toro and squeezed out the detail that the movie will take about three years to make, which seems a long time but is about the norm (if not pretty quick) for a stop-motion project.

Perhaps now the puppet’s good name can be rescued from the awful Roberto Benigni version that slumped into cinemas back in 2002.